Personal vs personnel

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Grammarist

Personal may be used as an adjective to mean belonging to a particular individual. Personal might mean private, not for public consumption or it may mean an action involving the actual presence of a certain individual. In North America, personal is sometimes used as a noun to refer to a classified advertisement written for the purpose of finding someone to have a relationship with. Personal comes from the Latin personalis, which means pertaining to a person.

Personnel is a plural noun that denotes the people who are employed in an organization such as a business, company or military service. The personnel department is often referred to as simply personnel, another term for a personnel department is human resources. Personnel comes from the 1837 French term personnel, which was used in contrast to the term matériel.

Examples

Royal memorabilia specialist Ian Shapiro said: “This is a very personal letter at a moment of deep emotion. (The Mirror)

Charities yesterday bowed to pressure to stop trading the personal data of donors in a victory for the Daily Mail. (The Daily Mail)

Business conditions will improve in Saudi Arabia, with personal financial situation to improve over the next six months, the latest Bayt.com Middle East and North Africa Consumer Confidence Index survey, conducted by Bayt.com, the Middle East’s number one job site, and YouGov, a leading market research agency, revealed. (The Saudi Gazette)

Later that night, she will return to the street and bump into Jalal (played by Jalilvand), a man from her past – the very person who placed a personal ad in the paper, offering to give away 30 million tomans to someone in need. It would pay for an operation for her invalid husband. (The Hollywood Reporter)

Personnel files released Friday by the Arlington Police Department give glimpses into Miller’s life. (The Dallas Morning News)

He believes that the Bruins continue to have a strong group of players, of leaders, willing and able to improve on the issues that resulted in their too-long summer and their changeover in personnel and management. (The Boston Globe)

Dutch military personnel defection to ISIS: Is NATO knowledge transfer an issue? (Pravda)

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